Spring of the Drowned Supernatural
by Crushafo
Summary: Bored with Ranma falling into the Spring of the Drowned Girl, I booted him into Spring of the Drowned Female Vampire. Naturally, chaos follows at suit.
1. Here's Ranma!

     It was a dark and stormy day. The residents of Nerima took no notice of it, as the lower side of Japan usually received many dark and stormy days during the spring and fall seasons. While many did stay inside their warm and snug homes because of the rain, there were a few people who were up and about, hurrying around on the rain-soaked sidewalks.      Their business was legimate though. The woman in the straw hat, which drooped with moisture, was running to the supermarket for some last-minute supplies for her dinner. The man hunched over in the plastic raincoat was hurrying home from work. The young girl with red hair, a thick Slavic accent, shocking porcelain-white skin, and very long, very sharp canines was running away from the wrinkled, ugly green beast chasing after her-      Wait a minute . . .      "I ztill zink it ztinkz, choozing a fiancé vizout azking me how I felt about it!"      The little green beast, bare of any hair and its arms twice as long as its legs and body, hissed angrily in return. The arms reached out and made a wild grab for the girl. But she had disappeared from before him in little more than a blur and was then directly behind the beast. She kicked it in the back of the head, sending the creature flying through the air into a lamppost, which bent half over upon impact.      "I'm going back to China," the girl snapped, "Zo zere old man!" She turned her back to him and began to stride away. The three or four figures on the street dashed away from her as she stalked towards their general direction.      Behind her, the little green beast opened one ugly red eye. It silently jumped to its feet and ripped a signpost from its place in the sidewalk. It took two jumps forward and landed behind the red-haired girl. She turned, her eyes wide with surprise. The only other thing she noticed was the sign coming hard down upon the flat of her face.      She was out like a light. The beast chuckled mirthlessly as it tossed the sign-a perfect imprint of the girl's face dented onto it-away from itself. The incredibly long arms reached out and picked the girl up. It froze, threw a glare at the shocked bystanders, and hissed at them. Its long purple tongue, forked at the end and spotted with gray, snaked out of its mouth and curled itself at them.      The people scattered, all present business forgotten in their haste to get as far away from the place and the creature as possible.   
  
  
     Soun Tendo stared at the postcard in his shaking hands. Whether from fear or from excitement, he was not sure himself. The back of the postcard showed a shadowy castle with lightening striking in the foreground and bats whirling around the turrets.      Bringing Ranma from China, the postcard read. Tendo smiled as he folded his hands together in a thankful position and glanced up towards the ceiling. "Nabiki! Kasumi!" he called. "Akane! Come to me!"      Kasumi wandered in from the kitchen where she was currently making curry as Nabiki entered from the side where she was doing her homework.      "Where's Akane?" Tendo asked as he looked over his two elder daughters.      "I think she is in the dojo, training," Kasumi replied.      "I'll get her." Nabiki left the room.   
  
  
     Akane stared down at the brick. It was overlaid with numerous faces, all of which belonged to people she was currently quite mad at. She flexed her fingers, and then brought her fist down upon the brick. It shattered cleanly in half and she brought her hand back.      "Don't you have better things to do than just beat up poor defenseless bricks?" Nabiki asked dryly from the doorway. Akane threw a glare at her and wished her away. Nabiki continued to speak, ignoring the glare and perhaps not knowing the thoughts dancing through her sister's head. "Father wants us." She turned and walked away, assuming that Akane would come.      Akane glanced down at the brick and sighed. She stood up, dusted her training gi off, and followed after her sister. When she reached the sitting room, Kasumi and Nabiki were both there, seated across the table from their father. Tendo was looking quite smug with himself and Kasumi was pouring tea.      "What did you want to tell us, Dad?" Nabiki asked.      Tendo smiled and crossed his arms over his chest. "I have some good news to tell you," he said. "A very good friend of mine-Genma Saotome-will be bringing his son Ranma to visit." The smile grew impossibly wider and tears began to shine brighter in Tendo's eyes. "Ranma is going to marry one of you!"      The girls stared at him. Akane looked shocked, and then her face flooded with anger. Nabiki gave her father a look that said, 'Someone has been reading too many cheap Harley Quinn novels.' Kasumi's face was smooth of any emotion.      "It has been a dream of Saotome's and mine to unite the two schools of Anything Goes! In fact, it is more than just a dream, but it is a matter of honor, decided long before any of you were born! Whoever marries Ranma will inherit the dojo." Tendo glanced at the faces of his daughters.      They continued to stare at him as if he had lost his mind.      Akane glared at him. "Honor or not, what makes you think that, for one minute, I'm going to marry any boy?"      "Father, this is crazy," Nabiki cut in.      Kasumi was in a world all of her own. "Is he young, father?" she asked. "I hope not. Young men are just so . . . young."      Akane and Nabiki gave her looks mingled between shock and disbelief. Kasumi returned them with one of blank confusion. Nabiki sighed, shook her head, and decided to take the matter up in a different way.      "What is this Ranma Saotome like?" she asked.      Tendo laughed, somewhat nervously, and turned away from them. He glanced downwards at the postcard, and then shrugged. "I don't know. I've never met him," he said hurriedly.      That did it. Anger and disgust clouded the features of all three daughters, only in different degrees for each one.      "You . . . don't know," Nabiki repeated slowly, not liking what she had just heard.      Tendo shrugged. "Genma was always taking his son out on training trips. In fact, they are just getting back from a training trip from China."      A muscle in Nabiki's cheek jumped. "Oh? China?" She frowned and closed her eyes. "Father, it appears that is haven't quite occurred to you that we may have had our own ideas as to who and when we want to marry?"      Kasumi sighed. "Father is only trying to think of what is best for our family."      Thankfully, the doorbell rang just then. Tendo jumped to his feet. "That must be them!" he cried out, hurrying towards the front door. Nabiki rolled her eyes and followed after her father, wanting to get a full measure of what exactly was going on within the family.      Akane growled and folded her arms across the table, dropping her chin upon her arms. Thoughts of what she would like to do to boys in general flitted through her mind-she lingered a while on the idea of stomping on one Tatawaki Kunou's head repeatedly. Her mood lightened a few notches.      Nabiki and Tendo, their mouths set in straight hard lines and their eyes wide with horror, ran back into the room. Nabiki's eyes fell upon her older and younger siblings and sisterly protection set it. She skidded to a halt before them and turned around, her body relaxing and falling into a protective stance. Tendo stopped at her side and turned around to face the direction they had just run from. Akane and Kasumi looked over their shoulders to see what was going on to make two members of the family react as such.      A wrinkled, hairless ugly green beast with a face as sharp and pointed as a dog's stepped into the room. It was carrying a squirming, cursing bundle with a mop of tangled red hair.      "Put me down old man! You'z zcaring zem!" It viciously lashed out at the creature holding it, the blow landing on the skinny shoulders. It winced, dropped the bundle, and shoved it before Tendo and Nabiki. They glowered down upon a girl. Her own mouth was set in a hard line, but two sharp canines dipped down and shone sharply in the light. Her red hair stood out like a beacon, even more so than normal because of her incredibly pale skin.      "Oh my," Kasumi said.      The girl threw a glare at the creature, which hissed at her, and she stood up. She glowered at Tendo and Nabiki, sighed, and bowed. "I'm Ranma Zoatome. Zorry about ziz."      Nabiki stared at the girl for a moment, and then jumped back in surprise when her father threw his arms around 'Ranma' and began to squeeze her in delight.      "Ranma! I'm so glad that you are here!" he cried. "You have no idea how long I've waited for this moment!"      The green creature began to hop up and down and hiss in delight. Ranma's foot shot out and kicked the creature in the head. It skidded across the floor, and then began to hop up and down, hissing in anger and shaking its fists at her.      Tendo suddenly tensed, and began to flex his arms. Ranma found herself pumped forward and backward slightly against his body. Tendo pushed her away and stared openly down at Ranma's chest. Nabiki followed her father's gaze at the budges in Ranma's shirt. She poked at one. Her finger sunk into the soft material, and she instantly knew what that was.      "Ranma is a girl!" she stated, spreading her hand wide over the budge.      Ranma glowered sourly at her. "Do you mind?" she grumbled.      Soun stepped away and began to stammer. "But . . . But . . . I don't understand. I was certain that Genma's son was a boy, and not a girl."      "Well, if his son is not a boy, then obviously his son is his daughter," Nabiki snapped. She poked Ranma's breast again. "Honestly, how could anyone mistake this for a boy? I can't exactly speak for the rest of us, but I'm most certainly not going to marry a girl!"      Soun did the only thing he felt he could do in such a situation in which to retain his pride. He fainted.      Ranma glanced sheepishly to the side, rubbing her sore breast. Akane immediately brightened up to learn that their new houseguest was a girl and not a b-b-b-b-non-girl. "Oh stop it," she said. "He-she is our guest. Is that any way to treat any guest?" She fluidly stood up and bowed slightly to Ranma. "Welcome to our household," she said politely. Kasumi followed suit by standing and nodding her head. "Would you like to go somewhere?"      "Um . . ." Ranma glanced sideways at the creature behind her. It hissed and shook its head no. She frowned and turned back to Akane. "Zure."      "Have you really studied Anything Goes?"      "Yah."      "Great! We can go to the dojo and spar together to see how good you are!" If her skin had not already been so white, Ranma probably would have turned pale. Akane grabbed Ranma's hand and jumped forward to pull her dojo, but she found herself jarred by the unexpected solidity of Ranma, who was not moving. "Oh come on," Akane said with a bright smile. "It won't be that bad. Just a friendly little spar!"      Ranma glanced over at the beast, which was shaking its head even harder. She turned back to Akane with a shrug. "Okay." They left the room. Nabiki and Kasumi, left with their father (who, by all accounts, really wasn't there as he was still out cold), and the scary green creature.      It smiled suddenly, revealing a double-row of sharp, gleaming teeth. Nabiki jumped back with a squeak. Kasumi stepped forward and bowed to it. "Would you like some hot tea?" she asked. At the word hot, the stubby ears perked up and a sign appeared in the creature's hand.     _ Yes, please,_ the sign read.   
  
  
     Ranma followed Akane into the dojo. She stared with in trepidation at the pile of rubble that used to be a brick, but looked up when Akane called her name. The Tendo girl was standing in the middle of the room, her body in a relaxed defense stance.      "Come on," Akane said cheerfully, "I'll let you take the first swing."      Ranma nervously licked her prominent canines as her lower lip quivered. She stared intently at Akane-or rather, Akane's neck. She twisted her hands and dug her long nails into her palms. Akane blinked.      "What are you staring at?" she asked.      "Nozing," Ranma began. Akane smiled.      "Fine, I'll attack first!" She launched forward, her fist outward. Ranma blinked out of sight and then silently and immediately appeared behind Akane without notice. Akane stumbled as she attempted to regain her balance and glanced wildly around for her opponent.      She whirled around to face Ranma, whose eyes were wide as she continued to stare at Akane's neck. Akane threw herself at Ranma for another punch, but that too was easily dodged in less than a heartbeat and Ranma was behind Akane once more. Her fingers flexing, Ranma's hand shot out and wrapped itself around Akane's neck from behind her. Ranma leaned forward, her mouth wide open, and then she stopped.      She released Akane and stepped back. Akane looked over her shoulder at Ranma, and then smiled. "Not bad," Akane said. She rubbed her collarbone. "I don't know if that is an actual move in the style, but hey. Anything goes, right?"      "I'm hungry," Ranma said. Her eyes shone unnaturally bright in the light. Akane nodded.      "I imagine so, after a long journey like that. What say we stop for now, maybe take a bath, and then get a snack?"      Ranma blinked. "Hot baz?" she asked. Akane nodded her head. "And food afterwardz?" Akane nodded again. "Yah, I like zat."   
  
  
     Ranma was skipping up the stairs, her heavily traveling pack slung over one shoulder, when Kasumi stopped her. "Oh, Ranma," she began. Ranma froze and stared openly at Kasumi's neck. "I've got the bath water prepared. Why don't you take your bath now? Place your bag in the guestroom over there." She shifted the load of towels she was carrying to one arm so she could freely point at a room. Ranma nodded, her eyes still on Kasumi's neck.      Kasumi tucked her hand beneath the towels and then moved to the staircase. Ranma shuffled over to the side so Kasumi could pass her. With an effort, Ranma tore her eyes from Kasumi and glanced at the bedroom that had been pointed out to her.   
  
  
     "Kasumi." Nabiki stepped into the kitchen. Her sister looked up from where she was seasoning the curry. "Who is that man with father?" Nabiki leaned against the doorframe. Kasumi blinked and went back to measuring the spices and mixing it with the pot boiling away at the stove.      "I don't know," she said. Nabiki sighed. She took a deep breath of the scents floating in the kitchen.      "Where is Akane?"      "I told her and Ranma to take a bath."      "Ah. That should keep her out of trouble."      A scream rocked the silence and echoed through the house. Akane half-fell half-ran down the stairs into the sitting room where a heavy man in a stained white gi, glasses, and a kerchief covering his bald head was sitting with her father. Akane screamed again as she stooped and picked the table between the men up, heaving it over her head. The teapot and teacups fell to the floor; steaming brown liquid splattered across the clean wood.      "I'LL DROWN HIM IN THE BATHTUB!" she screeched.      Kasumi and Nabiki hurried into the room.      "Drown who?" Kasumi asked calmly, her mellow voice cutting through the hazy anger that clouded Akane's mind.      Akane looked over her shoulder at her sisters. Her arms trembled slightly from the exertion of holding the table over her head. "There's a pervert in the bathroom!" she snapped. Kasumi's hand flew to her mouth in shock.      "Oh dear! I hope Ranma is all right!" Kasumi said, her voice full of concern.      "Huh?"      "I told her she could take a bath after her workout and trip through the rain."      A voice spoke from the stairway that Akane had hurried down. "I'm Ranma Saotome." Akane and the others turned to look at the muscular young man with springy black hair as he sheepishly trod down the stairs, his hands tucked into the pockets of his black pants. "Sorry about that."   
  
  
     The girls, seated at the table that Akane had set down roughly upon the floor, stared across the surface at their father, the man with the kerchief on his head, and Ranma.      "Girls," Tendo began happily, "I would like you to meet my old friend-"      "Genma Saotome," the man said for him, bowing slightly. "And this is my son, Ranma, whom you have already met." The girls did not say a thing. Nabiki was frowning as she tried to make heads and tails about what she had been told, Akane glared angrily at Ranma, and Kasumi merely looked blank.      Kasumi, feeling it was up to her to break the ice, spoke first. "So were you that girl from earlier?"      "Yes." Ranma nodded his head.      "What happened to your accent? And you are a boy now when you were a girl earlier."      Ranma sighed and hunched over slightly. Genma crossed his arms before him with concentration etched tightly in his serious features. "How do explain this . . ." he began slowly. "I really don't know where to begin." He sent his son a shifty look. Ranma noticed and he arched an eyebrow at it. "Why don't I begin-here!"      Genma leaped forward, picked Ranma up, and threw him across the room outside the open doors into the koi pond. Ranma hit the water with a startled cry, and went under for a moment. Up popped the red-haired girl. Her fangs gleamed dangerous and her eyes glittered brightly. "Vhat vaz zat for?" she demanded hotly.      Genma pointed a dramatic finger at Ranma and threw his head back. "Where did I go wrong?" he asked the sky loudly, as if speaking to a Greater Being. "I cannot stand to see my son like this! Ranma," he looked at his son-turned-daughter who dragged her waterlogged body from the water. "You break your father's heart!"      "Oh yah?" Ranma was suddenly behind her father and had kicked out, her foot catching the middle of his back. The man was propelled into the water. From out of it emerged the ugly green beast with the impossibly long arms. "Vhat are you talking about? My old man iz a gremlin!"      The creature hissed and pounced on Ranma, who began to twist around the arms and pound upon the body.      Nabiki leaned against the table, resting her chin upon her propped up hand. "Odd friends, father," she said. "Remind me never to go to your high school reunion."      Soun threw his arms up in the air. "They weren't always like this! Something tragic happened!"   
  
  
_      Six months earlier . . .   

_      Ranma, in his male form, stared down at the mist-covered valley. Multiple springs dotted the countryside, several poles rising from the depths of each pool. "So this is it?" he asked as his father moved past him and loped down the hill.      "This sirs," said the Chinese guide behind them, "is the land of the famous Cursed Springs of China. We in supernatural half."      "Don't lag boy," Genma called back without answering the questions. "Daylight is wasting!" Ranma jumped after his father,      "Wait sirs!" Their Chinese guide ran after them. "Be careful! Place full of bad luck!"      Genma came to a halt at the first pool. He shrugged his pack from off his back, dropping it to the ground. "Come on Ranma!" he said, jumping from the ground to the nearest pole sticking out of the pool. Ranma stopped next to the pack, dropped his own next to it, and then jumped onto the pole next to Genma's.      "Right behind you, old man!" Ranma called. The Chinese guide stopped at the packs and began to jump up and down to get their attention.      "Stop! You no know what you do! It bad if you fall into spring!"      Neither martial artist paid attention to him. They began to bounce from pole to pole, popping punched and lashing kicks out at one another. Finally, Ranma landed a solid kick in Genma's solar plexus that knocked the man from his pole into the spring it rose from. Ranma landed on it and stared into the rippling water. "Pop?" he asked.      "Oh no!" groaned the guide. "This very bad!"      The spring water burst upward as a green figure shot out of it and landed on a pole. Ranma felt his heart stop in shock. "Wha-what the hell is THAT thing?" he yelled shrilly at the guide, pointing wildly at the creature.      "Your father fall into spring of drowned gremlin. Now takes body of gremlin. Is curse!" the guide explained as he watched Ranma jump onto a pole to avoid the long stretch of the creature's arms. "Very tragic story, about gremlin who drown there twelve hundred year ago!"      "What?" Ranma's arms pin wheeled as he attempted to duck the gremlin's arms. "You never told us that part!" He ducked one arm and then jumped to try to avoid the other, but the original arm swung around and knocked him off the pole. Ranma fell into the spring with a cry.      The guide scratched his head and waited until a head emerged from the waters. "Oh! Too bad sir. You fall into spring of drowned female vampire from Transylvania. Very tragic tale of vampire lady who drown there six hundred year ago. Now, who ever fall into spring takes body of vampire girl with Slavic accent."      Ranma pulled herself from the spring. The gremlin stared down at her, its mouth dropped open in shock. In the bright sunlight, Ranma began to steam. She began to feel herself, glanced down in surprise, and pulled her shirt down to stare at the bouncing pair of breasts. She jumped out of the water and onto the pole instantly. "You!" she cried, pointing at the gremlin. "Zis is all your fault!" She grabbed her own throat in surprise. "My voice! Vhat is vrong viz my voice?"   
  
  
_      Present time . . .     
_ Vampire-Ranma and Gremlin-Genma continued to beat at one another. Soun jumped to his feet. "So when you are splashed with cold water, you turn into your cursed forms." A teakettle, steam drifting from its open spout, appeared in his hand. "But when splashed with hot water, you revert back to your normal form!" He tipped the kettle over and the water spilled out onto Gremlin-Genma.      "It needn't be that hot," Genma grumbled. Soun jumped forward, the teakettle dipping downward and water pouring out, trying to splash Vampire-Ranma. She jumped back with a yelp before a single drop could touch her.      Soun stepped back, his arms folded before himself, and laughed. "Well now, your problem isn't that bad. Anyways, back to the original reason why you are even here-" Soun jumped behind his daughters, startling all three of them. "You may chose any one of my daughters as your bride. This is Kasumi; she is nineteen. This is Nabiki; she's seventeen. And Akane, who is sixteen."      "He wants Akane," Nabiki jumped in. Kasumi brightened.      "Yes. He is much too young for me. He would be perfect for Akane."      They placed their hands on Akane's back and pushed her forward. "Hey! Me? Marry that pervert? Never!"      Vampire-Ranma glared at Akane. "Vhoze a pervert?"      "You are!"      "But Akane," Kasumi put in gently, "Ranma is only half a boy!"      "Yes. So you can only half-hate him," Nabiki agreed calmly. "You'd get along with him half the time, at least, which is twice as much more than what we can say for any other male between the age of twelve and twenty-one."      "But-but-he saw me in the nude! He's a lech!"      "Vait a minute!" Vampire-Ranma jumped to her feet. "You valked in on me!"      "But you looked at me!"      "Vat else could I do? You vere in ze line of my vision!" Vampire-Ranma turned to her father. "Forget it old man!" She started to walk away.      "Ranma!" She froze at her father's voice. "Where are you going?"      "I'm going back to China. I have got to find out how to change permanently into a boy!"      "Oh?" Akane jumped to her own feet. "What is wrong with being a girl?"      "Everything vhen you vere born a boy!" Vampire-Ranma turned to look directly at Akane. "It vouldn't be zo bad if I vere juzt a girl, or even juzt a vampire, but I am both! You have no idea vhat zat iz like! Not to mention I go from being alive to being undead!" She turned away, and then stopped. She threw a wicked glance over her shoulder. "By ze vay, I noticed zat you got a pretty good look at me!"      Akane sputtered a couple of times before she could reply to that. "It's different when a boy looks at a girl!"      "Izzat zo? Vell zhen, it really should not have mattered, zinze it iz no big deal for me to look at myzelf." She smiled smugly, her canines appearing slightly longer than usual. "Bezidez," she looked away, "I am better built to boot! Ha ha ha!" Akane growled and whirled to pick the table up once more. She brought it down hard upon Ranma's head.      It splintered and then shattered into several pieces. Ranma merely flinched. "Ouch!" She glared at Akane. "Vhat vas zat for?"      Akane jumped back. "You're not human!" she cried.      "I'm human. Juzt undead."      Kasumi sighed. "Oh my. As a vampire, you would be stronger and faster than humans." Vampire-Ranma shrugged. Kasumi stood up. "I suppose I better get rid of all the garlic in the house . . ." 


	2. School is no place for horsing around

     Akane woke to the sounds of fighting. Flesh smacking against flesh; the cracking of dislocated bones and popping joints; the whump of something heavy landing upon the ground; the whistling of something moving through air quick enough to slice sound; and, of course, the insults.      "You're moving slow, old man!"      "Are you sure it isn't because you're losing your touch, Ranma?"      "Nah. Old age must finally be catching up with you! Ow!"      Akane forced herself out of bed. A new day with perhaps new things to learn, but the same old stupid problems to put up with all the time. She swung her feet over the side of the bed and yawned. Akane ran her hand through her hair and winced as she accidentally tugged hard at the snarls, pulling and pinching her tender scalp.      She pulled herself completely out of bed and stretched with a yawn. Nabiki, passing through the hall, stopped and looked through the empty room. "Can't sleep?" she asked.      Akane stopped in mid-yawn. "Huh?" A crash from outside drifted in through her window. Akane frowned and pointed a finger at the window. "With that going on? Of course not." Nabiki nodded in agreement.      "At any rate, you can help me give Kasumi her medicine before we leave for school. Hurry and get dressed." Nabiki departed and Akane threw a look around her room, searching for her school uniform.   
  
  
     Their morning fight was nearing the end when Genma kicked his son into the koi pond. "Breakfast!" he said over his shoulder as he walked to the open room where the others were gathering around to eat.      A wave of water, followed by a bucket to the head, was Ranma's response. Gremlin-Genma hissed at his son and held a sign up, which read, "Cheap shot!"      "Nyah nyah," Vampire-Ranma replied, sticking her tongue out and wagging her fingers at Gremlin-Genma.      Placing a platter of tofu at the table, Kasumi sighed. "Oh my," she said. "What do gremlins eat?"      "Vhat about me?" Vampire-Ranma asked.      Nabiki gave him a dry look. "We all know the legends. Vampires need blood to survive. I for one am not going to make it a habit to donate my blood for your appetite."      "I'll get the hot water," Akane said, standing up.   
  
  
     The limo that pulled up to the front of the dojo was a daily occurrence. Though cars were rarely seen in Nerima because of the high prices of gas and taxes placed upon automobiles, the Kunou family could fell afford such a luxury.      Indeed, the dark-haired, graceful figure clad in a fluffy turquoise blue jumper with white puffy sleeves that exited the limo and stepped across the threshold of the dojo and half-skipped half-walked to the entrance was even more familiar than the limo.      Kodachi Kunou entered the house as if she lived there (and with as much time as she spent there, she may as well have) and headed directly to the family room. "Akane?" she called out in a sing-song voice.      From where she was watching Genma and Ranma (now both human and male thanks to a dash of hot water) fighting over a single bowel of rice, Akane waved her hand. "In here!" Kodachi already knew where Akane would be though.      "Good morning," said the young woman as she entered the room. "Are we ready for school? Oh? Who are these two men? Introduce me, Akane!" Kodachi declared as she sat beside Akane and nudged her in the side with her elbow.      "Uh . . ." Akane and Ranma exchanged quick glares. Kodachi's eyebrows shot up.      "He doesn't like you?" she asked. She laughed and clapped her hands. "A young, vibrant male actually doesn't like you?"      Nabiki spooned sugar into her tea. "He's only male part-time," she said.      "Hey!" Ranma turned his glare at the middle Tendo daughter. She returned it with an innocent What are you looking at me for? I didn't do anything! look. Genma took advantage of the distraction and snatched up the bowel he and Ranma were fighting over and wolfed down the rice.      "Do tell." Kodachi folded her arms across the table and eyed Ranma.      "It'll cost you," Nabiki said automatically. Kodachi shrugged.      "I won't pay a single cent!" She turned to Akane with a smile. "He doesn't like you and it is because he is only male part of the time? Whatever does your sister mean by that?" Akane glared at Ranma again, who just then noticed what his father had pulled.      "Hey! That was mine!" Ranma pounced upon Genma and they rolled across the floor, each fighting for balance and to keep the other unsteady. Akane glanced at her wristwatch.      "Oh dear! Look at the time!" She jumped to her feet. "We have to be getting to school."      "Oh yes." Nabiki stood up. "Come on, Ranma."      Ranma froze from where he was twisting his father's arm. "School?" he echoed.      Akane looked just as surprised as Ranma. "He's not coming with us, is he?" she demanded.      "I ain't going to no school!" Ranma released Genma and jumped to his feet. "I'm going back to China!" Genma tossed him a school bag, pulled from the same place he pulled his signs from as a gremlin.      "Oh yes you are, boy."      "Oh no I ain't!" Ranma shoved the bag back into Genma's arms.      "Oh yes you are!" Genma shoved it back.      Kodachi watched the actions repeated several times, and then launched into her infamous laugh. "HO HO HO HO HO!" Ranma and Genma, the only ones not used to the fearsome sound, froze and stared at her with horror. "Regardless of what is going on, we must leave now should we wish to get to school on time!" She launched into her laugh again, reached across the space between her and Ranma, and grabbed him painfully by the ear. "Come along. I won't have us late because of you!" She pulled him along; Nabiki (holding Ranma's school bag) and Akane trailed behind her. "While we are heading there, you may also explain to me why you are only male part of the time."   
  
  
     "This curse and engagement is quite interesting," Kodachi said cheerfully as she sipped her club soda. Ranma stared with awe at the inside red velvet lining of the limo's interior. Kodachi glanced sideways at Akane, who was sitting beside her. "Since he turns into a she, then I imagine that is why he doesn't react to your curse." Akane sputtered a couple of times as a response and then lapsed into a sulky silence.      Ranma looked at Akane. "You have a curse, too?"      "It's nothing like yours!" Akane snapped. "As far as I'm concerned, yours is better than mine!"      Ranma snorted. "Huh! Nothing could be worse than mine!"      "I don't know," Nabiki said. She was sitting beside Ranma and across from Akane. "Neither of the curses are really that bad." Both Akane and Ranma glared at her. Kodachi covered her mouth with her hand and laughed, but this laugh was quieter and somewhat gentler than her ear-shattering laugh from earlier.      "Oh come now! Let us just tell darling Ranma what the curse is and let him decide!"      Akane frowned and turned to stare at the limo's wall.      "If you won't tell," Kodachi said, "then I shall."      "I will," Nabiki cut in. Kodachi looked at her in challenge. "Akane is your best friend. Akane is my sister. Best friends shouldn't tell secrets, but sisters can get away with being annoying." The limo began to slow. "Besides, we are almost there and it is your turn to help Akane with the boys."      Kodachi shrugged and nodded in agreement.      "Help Akane with the boys?" Ranma looked at Nabiki.      "You see, Akane has this slight problem with the male species of a general age," Nabiki began just as the limo came to a complete stop. Kodachi unfolded her legs and placed the club soda in a drink holder. She placed a hand upon the door handle.      "On your call," she began. Akane took a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and nodded her head.      "Now."      Kodachi's hands flew downward. The limo's door popped open quickly and silently and the two girls jumped from it.      A rumbling filled the air. A cloud of dust floated upward.      A huge mob of boys, armed with anything from hockey sticks to nurf bats to salamis and anything else they could swing, appeared from out of nowhere, stampeding in their direction. Akane plowed into them with a war cry that sounded very much like, "I HATE BOYS!" and Kodachi, laughing her ear-splitting shriek and twirling a purple ribbon, followed after her.      "You see, there was this geeky kid in fifth grade," Nabiki began as Ranma watched the mass-well, it could only be slaughter as Kodachi and Akane cleared enjoyed beating up on the male species-take place. "His name was Gosenki, and he had this crush on Akane-since first grade, I believe. Gos is a really creepy kid who likes to dabble in the darker arts-" Akane moved through the ranks of the boys, her fist flying to knock heads off shoulders and her book bag swinging out to smack into chests, stomachs, and groping hands "-and he came across this enchantment thing that would make the wearer become a magnet of the opposite sex."      Kodachi's twirling purple ribbon lashed out, leaving welts, tripping boys into other boys, and getting tangled within hands and legs.      "This is a strange charm. Anyways, something went wrong with the spell so it stuck itself to Akane. We didn't know this until she hit the age of twelve. The spell will last until she is twenty-one. It's called a magnet spell. You see, if you flip the number twelve, you wind up with twenty one. Also, there is a nine year gap between these numbers, and if you flip the number nine, then you get the number six."      Akane and Kodachi finished off the last of the boys. A rose flew through the air and Akane plucked it up as it passed her. Kodachi groaned upon looking at it.      "Ah, if it is the fair and beauteous Akane," began a light male voice.      "So, until she is twenty-one, there will be this unnatural magnetism that Akane gives off for boys. And ever since Tatewaki Kuno," the young man who threw the rose stepped from the shadows of a tree and bowed to Akane, this Nabiki pointed out, "announced that whoever beat Akane could date her, we've had a problem like this daily."      "That's rough," Ranma grumbled.      "Brother dear," Kodachi said as she stepped forward, "you are a duck."      Tatewaki blinked. "Huh?"      "Yes dear, you are a duck right now."      Tatewaki was a tall, roughly handsome young man wearing a traditional kimono. A muscle in his cheek jumped. "A duck?"      "Yes dear. Today you are a duck."      The muscle jumped again. "Quack?" And then Tatewaki was upon the ground, flapping his arms to the side. "Quack quack!" Nabiki grabbed Ranma's arm and pulled her over to Kodachi's and Akane's side.      "I've told him," Nabiki said. "Now he can tell you about his curse." She looked down at Tatewaki. "Is it any wonder why he is on medication too?" Tatewaki "fluffed" his "feathers" (which consisted of him shaking his clothes and their becoming poofy), and began to waddle over to Nabiki's side. "Follow me to class," she said as she walked slowly toward the school.      "Quack?"      "Yes, ducks do attend school. Now come along." Kodachi laughed her ear-splitting shriek as she watched her brother waddle after a patient Nabiki.      "You are cruel," Akane said, though her tone was light as if she didn't mean it. "But I'm afraid Ranma's curse will have to wait to be told. We do need to get to school."      "Of cour-" And that was when, right on time, the skies which had been so bright and sunny only minutes ago, clouded up and it rained.      Kodachi and Akane found themselves staring at the red-haired girl with fangs.      Vampire-Ranma's skin, in the pale light, began to turn red and smoke. "Gah!" Akane grabbed her arm.      "Come on!" she called, dragging Vampire-Ranma to the nearby shed even as the remaining students, knocked over, bruised, and basically sore, ran into the school away from the rain.   
  
  
     "So you're a vampire?" Kodachi grinned, and then turned to Akane. "I agree with Ranma. Your curse is better." Akane grimaced at the mention of her problem. She was currently leaning against the open window within the dark shed as Ranma sat in the middle of the shed amongst the boxes, her legs folded beneath herself.      "But she's got is easy!" Akane replied, handing Ranma the teakettle she had fetched as Ranma told Kodachi about the curse. "She's just a vampire."      "You call being allergic to the sun and garlic and sharp things and holy water and crucifixes easy?" Ranma shot back. Akane gave him a startled look and he shrugged. "Look, western vampires aren't the same as the eastern vampires here. If I had to be a vampire, I would much prefer being an eastern one. I mean, the only sort of problem they supposedly have is a thirst for blood. As a western vampire, I'm stuck with a whole lot more problems than a thirst."      "Is it true that if you get hit with direct sunlight, you burst into dust?" Kodachi asked.      "You just revel in my pain, don't you?" Ranma grumbled. She grinned again and he sighed. "No, because that would mean having to kill my regular, non-cursed form. They are linked together, you know. That is a where a perpetual and very painful sunburn comes in."      "Perpetual?"      "You don't want to know."      "Yes I do."      "I just get redder and redder and the sunburn gets worse and worse over time."      "Until you're like, peelings and bloody and all that?"      He grimaced. "Yes."      "Has it ever occurred to either of you," Akane began impatiently, "that we are late for class?"      Kodachi waved a hand. "Who cares? This is much more interesting than ancient history!" She leaned forward. "Is there any way in which to cure this?"      "I could find the spring of the drowned man, but I don't think one exists."      "Oh? Why?"      "Because they are called Spring of the Drowned SUPERNATURAL for a reason."      "Ah. And a man isn't very supernatural. Well, maybe there are some other things that you would rather be."      Ranma shrugged. "Like what? A werewolf?" He snorted. "I don't think so. The last thing I want to do is go around scratching my fleas and peeing on the carpet."      "Hmm." Kodachi looked thoughtful. "Well, how about a werecat? Cats are cleaner."      Ranma stiffened and his eyes grew wide. "C-c-cat? No, thank you." The girls exchanged knowing looks and then leaned closer to him.      "Why, Ranma," Akane began in a teasing voice, "do you have a problem with cats?"      Ranma flinched. "C-c-cats? Why no! Absolutely not!" He gave them a nervous smile and tried to look as innocent as possible. Kodachi and Akane merely gave him a look that said, "You've got a secret, and we'll wring it out of you. If not today, then tomorrow."      Ranma gave them another smile. "Shouldn't we be going to school?" he asked.      Kodachi sighed and twined a lock of hair around a finger. "Oh, I suppose. Though it really isn't as interesting as this! HO HO HO HO! Well, we best be going if we don't want people to wonder."   
  
  
     "Oh?" Akane's sarcastic voice drifted through the empty hall. "And our standing outside in the hall with buckets isn't going to have people wondering?"      Kodachi shrugged. "We would have gotten away with my story of how the limo had a flat tire if Ranma hadn't open his big mouth about our morning fight."      They sent identical glares at Ranma, who was standing between them with a pair of buckets from his hands. "Water," he grumbled. "Why is it always water?" He then eyed the buckets the girls were holding. "Do you two think you'll get into trouble if you sort of set the buckets on the floor?" he asked.      Akane leaned forward. Ranma jumped back as the water in her buckets sloshed over the edge onto the floor. "Why?" she demanded hotly. "Don't think we're capable of handling ourselves?"      "Well no, not really," he began, still eyeing the bucket nervously. Akane stomped her foot angrily.      "You are just impossible!" she snapped. Kodachi rolled her eyes.      "Drop it Akane," she said. "Before I laugh."      Akane snorted and looked away from Ranma.      A long moment of silence followed. Ranma spoke. "So, how long have you two known one another?" he asked.      Kodachi shrugged her shoulders. "Akane and I have been friends since her mother died."      "Ah. I'm sorry," Ranma replied automatically.      Akane shrugged. "It's okay," she said softly. "Mom has been dead for eleven years. She was killed in a car accident."      "Oh." Ranma blinked. "That's strange. My mom died eleven years ago in a car accident too. That why me and Pop went on our training trip."      Another long moment of silence followed. This one, however, was broken by a war-like cry from the throat of Tatewaki Kuno.   
  
  
     Nabiki watched as her homeroom teacher argued with Tatewaki. "No, you are absolutely not a duck!" he said. Kuno just stared at him as he perched upon the top of his desk, his arms folded against his sides as his clothes fluffed out to the sides.      "Quack?" he asked curiously. He looked over at Nabiki for support, who glanced the other way. "Quack quack?" He cocked his head the teacher.      "You are not a duck," the teacher said again.      "Quack?"      "You are not a duck. You are human. You are in a classroom. You are here to learn."      "Quack!"      "You are not a duck!" The teacher looked over the class. The students were being quiet and solemn. "Is he a duck?" he asked the students. A collective shake of head in the universal sign for no followed. Tatewaki craned his neck to look over his shoulder at the students.      "Quack?" he asked again.      Nabiki sighed. "Kuno," she began, "Akane has a fiancé."      The change that overcame Tatewaki was almost startling to watch. Human awareness snapped to his eyes as he leapt to his feet to the top of the desk. "What foul low life would have the nerve to steal the beauteous Akane from myself?" he demanded loudly.      A piece of chalk smacked him between his eyes and Tatewaki toppled off his desk onto the floor.      "Tatewaki . . ." The teacher's hand trembled as he clenched it into a tight fist. "That is enough of your absurd behavior! Go stand out in the hall right now!"      Nabiki opened a book before herself as Tatewaki trudged past.      A few moments later, she heard the sound of running footsteps and knew that Tatewaki had decided to see this fiancé of Akane's for himself. And a few moments after that, Tatewaki was yelling.   
  
  
     Ranma, Kodachi, and Akane dodged Tatewaki as he barreled past them. Tatewaki whirled around, pulled a bokken out of nowhere, and faced the three. "Never," he yelled, "in my life should the one beauteous Akane be forced into marriage with such a horrendous fiend when said beauteous Akane deserves the best, and as I am such, then she deserves me!"      "Brother," Kodachi began, but was cut off when the point of the bokken swung around to her.      "I shall not listen to your fiendish lies anymore, sister!" Tatewaki snarled. He faced Akane. "Who is the vile scum who would force your hand in marriage?"      Akane glared at Tatewaki. "He's fifty years old, fat, ugly, and stupid. He wears glasses too."      "Hey!" Ranma set the buckets down with a clatter. "Pop is forty-two years old! Not fifty!"      Tatewaki looked shocked. "A delicate flower," he cried unhappily, "forced, in the prime of her bloom, to marry a geezer!"      Ranma sighed. "My father isn't a geezer, okay! And he's not the one who's supposed to marry Akane, I am!"      Kodachi slapped her forehead with a groan. Tatewaki's face grew redder and redder the more he stared at Ranma, and sound finally burst out of his frame in a deep roar. "Never! I shall not permit it!" He launched forward to attack Ranma, but Ranma leapt over his head. Tatewaki tripped over a bucket and pitched forward in his face.      The door of the classroom Akane and Kodachi stood beside burst open. Students crammed themselves forward to see what the ruckus was about. Ranma turned to Kodachi. "Who is he?" he asked.      Kuno answered for him as he stood up. "I," he said, his voice laced with vanity, "am the Blue Thunder of Furinkan High! Tatewaki Kuno!" Thunder boomed in the distance. Ranma ducked and hid his head beneath his hands as he peered upward at the roof. Akane rolled her eyes.      "I thought he was the Shooting Star last week," she whispered behind her hand to Kodachi. Kodachi shrugged.      "He got tired of my calling him Twinky Toes."      Tatewaki struck out at Ranma again, but Ranma, still covering his head with his arms, wove around the blow.      "Come on!" he called to Tatewaki, running for an open window. A quick look at the skies told him that they were clear. "Let's take this fight outside where no one will get hurt! Here's a shortcut!" He leapt out the window.      "That's the third story window!" Akane called. Kodachi laughed her ear-splitting laugh.      "How lucky that the swimming pool below will break his fall!" she laughed as Tatewaki jumped out of the window after Ranma. At that moment, Ranma screamed in what could have been fright, or perhaps it was rage.      "WATER?! WHY IS IT ALWAYS WATER?!" 

  
  


_Author's notes_  
It's me! =) I'd just like to thank those of you who have reviewed the story. Some of you echoed the ideas that I had, and some of you gave me some new concepts to work on. For the person who brought up the bit about Gremlins and Slavic vrs. Scandinavian accents, I do have a couple of things to address about.  
Firstly, Gremlins weren't truly given an actual appearence until, during World War Two, when airplanes all over the world suddenly had stimulous engine trouble, one German over his radio was heard shouting, "Gremlin! Gremlin!" Because of the size of the engine, it was then concluded that Gremlins had to be small. However, before that, they were only known to be vicous creatures with a very vile temper. The Gremlin I based Genma off of came mostly from a Super Nintendo game called, "Air Raids 2."   
Secondly, I do know more about mythical creatures than I have actually let on, and some people might scream about the situation of Ranma and his perpetual sunburn. I did think of him turning into dust, being blown away into this pot of hot water, and then appearing. I might change what I have written and still do that, but frankly, it has always been one of my theories that the cursed form and the real form are tied into one and the other. It's like animorphs and their subzero reasoning of where all the extra mass goes.  
And by the by, while I am discussing curses, I may as well put a word in about Akane's. Akane is not one of my favorite characters, but still, she deserves a chance at being mature. The thing about the numbers were purely coincedental (the backwards twelve being twenty-one and the differences between six and nine), and I just grabbed the coincedence they presented.   
That's all the notes I can think of putting together, except to state that yes, it was a Slavic accent and not a Scandinavian accent, thoough that mistake was wrought upon by my unable to recall the proper S word for the accent, but knew the country was in that vincinity of the continent. 


End file.
